


It's the Silent Ones That Kill You

by Cat42103



Category: Naruto
Genre: Anbu Hatake Kakashi, Angst, Character Study, Feels, Happy Ending, Hatake Kakashi-centric, M/M, Sad, Suicidal Thoughts, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, i think that's how you do it?, it's just my interpretation of Kakashi, well this isn't really a story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-30
Updated: 2021-01-30
Packaged: 2021-03-16 17:34:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29086197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cat42103/pseuds/Cat42103
Summary: “We’re going to rebuild the clan, someday,” his father said, standing tall and firm in the morning light.“You’re the last of your clan today,” they said, cleaning off the blood on his clothes with clinical detachment.Kakashi had sat in the red pool for hours, feeling the blood congeal and the body next to him cool.Sakumo was a fool. A weak coward who’s emotions ruled over his head.But he was Kakashi’s father.He looked in the mirror and saw messy silver hair, the bangs hanging over his dark eyes. And without his mother's delicate nose and cheekbones visible, he looked like Sakumo.
Relationships: Dai-nana-han | Team 7 & Hatake Kakashi, background Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto - Relationship
Comments: 3
Kudos: 48





	It's the Silent Ones That Kill You

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "The Silent" by The Tragic Tantrum
> 
> This all canon events and how I thought Kakashi dealt with them. I still find it horribly tragic that he lost so many people at such a young age, and I was ready for some angst.

When Kakashi was young, he didn’t have a mother. Everyone else did, but he wasn’t everyone else.

It was just him and his father, his father and him.

Same eye color and same wild silver hair. He had his mother’s delicate features and beauty mark, and he noticed that sometimes his father wouldn’t look at him.

Kakashi started wearing a mask.

He didn’t ask why the compound was so large for only two people, he heard the whispers. They were the last Hatakes. A whole compound full of life that would never be, silence stretching through too many hallways and rooms.

“We’re going to rebuild the clan, someday,” his father said, standing tall and firm in the morning light.

“You’re the last of your clan today,” they said, cleaning off the blood on his clothes with clinical detachment.

Kakashi had sat in the red pool for hours, feeling the blood congeal and the body next to him cool.

Sakumo was a fool. A weak coward who’s emotions ruled over his head.

But he was Kakashi’s father.

He looked in the mirror and saw messy silver hair, the bangs hanging over his dark eyes. And without his mother's delicate nose and cheekbones visible, he looked like Sakumo.

Right there in the mirror, his father stared back at him, and Kakashi could almost see his eyes crinkling as they always did when he looked at his son.

He lowered the mask to wash off the blood the medics missed, watching the red water tumble down the drain. He glanced back up and his father was gone.

Only Kakashi was in the mirror, no Sakumo.

Unbidden, tears welled up and a lump swelled in his throat. His breath came rapidly as he scrabbled wildly and yanked up his mask.

Only once the fabric stretched over his nose did he calm. 

His father was right in front of him, and they would get through this.

It was just him and his father, his father and him.

* * *

  
  


Obito was dead.

Dead, dead, _dead._

Choosing your comrades over the rules got you killed, but choosing the rules over your comrades got someone else killed.

The sharingan eye throbbed, the transplant fresh. 

No one spoke. Minato’s shoulders were bowed and Rin’s face was soaked with tears.

As soon as he got back to his apartment, Kakashi ran to the bathroom and retched. Both eyes were open wide despite the pain, and a desperate cry broke from his throat.

He staggered to the sink and the mirror behind it, stumbling to his knees right before he got there. Bracing a hand on either side, he heaved himself upright to meet his own gaze.

The tomoe spun lazily in his eye, and Kakashi breathed out shakily. Obito wasn’t gone.

He was right there, in the mirror.

He didn’t take off his mask. 

* * *

  
  


Rin’s blood was matted under his finger nails, the electricity still buzzing in his veins. Maybe it was his imagination.

Her last breaths had been more like gasps, ragged heaves that shook her frame before stilling. Her eyes were glassy, and Kakashi couldn’t picture anything else.

Minato had pulled him into a hug, but Kakashi didn’t so much as twitch. He killed his teammate in cold blood, watching her die by his hand.

He was at the Memorial Stone more often than not.

Kakashi liked his disguise. It allowed him to blend in with civilians and generally go unnoticed. His brown hair was soft and the purple face paint was refreshing against a face that rarely touched the air.

He studied his reflection, wiping off a crooked smear. Rin stared back at him, all sunny smiles and bright words, and Kakashi could breathe easily again.

She was right there, in the mirror.

* * *

When Minato and Kushina died, there was no one to hug him and make it all better. When he sat at the Memorial Stone, no one came to get him and tell him to go inside.

The cold bit into his skin, seeping through the thin fabric, but he didn’t move. 

There was a hole in his chest, a chill residing in his heart instead of warmth. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t see them in the mirror.

No one told him if their son had survived.

He wondered if the Hatake Compound was still untouched. His father’s blade, still bloody from that moment years ago, might still rest there. 

It would be sharp enough.

Kakashi could stop this cycle. There was only one unifying factor of the death and destruction, and that was him.

One more death would hardly weigh on Konoha, and no one would miss him.

It was all so frighteningly easy. A clean cut and he could die quickly. A small smile flashed across his face.

Then he shook himself.

_What are you doing, Kakashi? You’re privileged. People have it worse off than you, so you can’t complain. Besides, you are a major player in battle. You are useful. You can end it when you aren’t, but that time is not now. Stop being selfish._

So he went back to his cold, dead apartment. He touched his father’s silver hair and Obito’s eye and whispered, “Goodnight.”

* * *

What kind of system allowed so many to die for doing what they were supposed to do? Konoha was not peaceful, and it wasn’t safe if everyone he loved died.

These were the kind of thoughts that made it very tempting to go through with the order. To assassinate the Hokage and let his corrupt ways be destroyed.

But then Danzo would take the position. That was the far worse choice.

He told the Hokage, and ROOT was “disbanded.” 

ANBU welcomed him.

He had unreasonable hours.

Good.

Less time to think. To wonder what he could’ve done better and how he could’ve saved them and to wonder if this was really what they wanted.

Kakashi fought and killed and came back to his room with blood spattered shirts and torn clothes. That was all he did.

It was blissfully silent of any pesky thoughts or feelings. 

* * *

Kakashi was assigned his genin team, and he hated being out of ANBU. Minato’s son laughed loudly with Kushina's face, his blond hair swaying.

Ah. There were Minato and Kushina.

They weren’t in the mirror. _Only so many could be_ , he thought.

He hadn’t felt in a long time and only talked to a handful of adults in the past years, and his conversation was halting.

They were completely new people, but Kakashi couldn’t help the little voice that whispered _Second chance, second chance._

If he thought about it for even a minute, it was obvious Sakura was not Rin. Naruto was not Obito, and Sasuke was not him.

But it became a drive.

If Kakashi could’ve gone back he would’ve been nicer, communicated, been closer. He lived vicariously through Sasuke.

He kept forgetting that Sasuke was not him, had different wants and needs and ideas. 

Kakashi was as kind to Naruto and Sakura as he would’ve been to Rin and Obito. It wasn’t easy, the situations in his head too different from reality, but he tried.

But Sasuke, in his mind, was Kakashi. And Kakashi had to do better, be better, in a way the others hadn’t.

However much they compared to his old team, he cared for them as a new team.

After Zabuza, there was something to fight for. He wouldn’t die until they made at least chunin, he decided.

It would be selfish of him to die when he had students to teach, and one of them might find his body. Might sit next to the corpse for hours until it cooled. Might see him in the mirror.

So he didn’t.

* * *

Sasuke left, leaving a broken Team 7 in his wake.

He loathed whoever had caused such upset in his pack, his little family. He knew it was himself.

If he’d said the right thing, seen what was coming, he could’ve stopped it. Kakashi should’ve died before he had a team. It would have been merciful.

But it seemed a far better punishment to live, to see what he’d done to Sakura and Naruto and Sasuke in one fell swoop.

He’d wanted to end the cycle so no one else died, but he’d put it off. 

He was useless. A murder. A killer. A traitor. A liar. A thief. 

It didn’t matter which were true and which weren’t, because he believed every one of them.

* * *

Obito had mint green scales and terrible scars. Had one sharingan eye and a story to tell.

Kakashi didn’t see a monster, but something to grab onto when he was drowning in grief and guilt and anger.

And when he died for the second time, he couldn’t help but think it was worse. To know that his imaginings of doing better, being better, to Obito could have been real, only to fail and lose him again.

His absence dragged his heart down, rocks settling in his stomach, but his chest was an empty cavity.

Like a Chidori speared him right through the heart.

* * *

Kakashi stood on the edge of a building, staring ahead in the dark as the breeze ruffled his hair. Naruto sat a few buildings away, eyes up and forward, calmer than he’d ever seen him.

Sasuke was tucked into his side, head resting on his shoulder.

Kakashi watched them. 

Watched the peaceful curl of the Uchiha’s lips and the tension leaking from his posture. How Naruto’s arm curled around him protectively, as if he would disappear at any moment.

They were wholly absorbed in one another, sinking into each other's presence and melting into an embrace.

Naruto stroked back a dark piece of hair to tuck behind Sasuke’s ear, and he let him. Didn’t flinch, didn’t question the action, just leaned into the touch.

That kind of intimacy was built up from years of anger and grief and loss.

If Sasuke was Kakashi, did that mean he could’ve had it too?

If he’d played his cards a little differently, or dealt with the very pain Sasuke went through better, would he not be alone?

Kakashi could be curled into someone’s side, comfortable in a bond that could never be broken. He wouldn’t be so desperately alone, looking in the mirror for a scrap of what he lost.

The thoughts crept into his mind like acid, cutting a path through everything else. When Naruto sent Sasuke a soft look, Kakashi’s stomach curdled at the reminder that he had no one. When one of them left for a mission, they kissed and whispered their farewells, and Kakashi knew no one would care if he never returned.

If he’d done it better, acted differently, been less selfish.

He could have what they had.

  
  


But Sakura wasn’t Rin and Naruto wasn’t Obito. 

And most of all, Sasuke wasn’t Kakashi.

They weren’t the same people with the same lives. This wasn’t a second chance on which he got to play the gods.

They were his students.

And if Sasuke managed to find love where Kakashi hadn’t, there was no connection. He couldn’t do anything to change what happened in the past.

As the sun finally broke the horizon, Kakashi breathed. The smell of morning dew on leaves swirled around him, and he looked up into the lightening sky.

He saw them every time he looked into a mirror, saw them in his students and in the streets. His precious people were gone, a dried up river from which Kakashi could no longer drink.

Though they would never leave him, he didn’t want to join them just yet. He wanted to challenge Gai and learn how Sakura was faring at being a medic, to ruffle Naruto’s hair and tell Sasuke stories of the brother who died to protect him. 

His heart still hurt with every breath he took, with every day he lived without them, but he loved his students.

When they came over for dinner or found him to ask a question or told him a story, they soothed his heartache. He could smile and laugh and see how precious they were without having to lose them first.

His breath puffed out in visible clouds and he turned, striding back the way he came.

 _If only I could have someone_ , he’d thought, for years and years. Wasted them away with wanting, but never getting. And truly, what life had he lived, wallowing in the past with only graves to keep him company?

Kakashi didn’t want to die anymore, he wanted to live with a fervor that surprised him.

He wanted to spend time with his students and friends and bask in their warmth. He wanted to live for them.

Kakashi didn’t want to leave them behind as he had been left behind, because they were his precious people now.

And that was enough.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, this...has delayed my other fic. I'm sorry.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed it, or it at least made you feel some emotion. Thank you for reading.


End file.
